The Best Jobs In College Football
My premise is simple: throw open every major college coaching job in our blessed land. Where would the coaches and cognoscenti sprint to build their empire?
Tradition is nice and not to be underestimated, but facilities and access to fertile recruiting grounds are better. Fan passion is important, but if you’re in ruralia, capturing televisions is the name of the game. And never ever underestimate the value of a football friendly administration.
I’d Cut Off Multiple Fingers To Coach Here (8):
Florida
USC
Texas
LSU
Ohio State
Georgia
Oklahoma
Michigan
I don’t think anyone is going to debate these choices too passionately, though Georgia and LSU had been moderate underachievers before finding their groove over the last decade. They are elite jobs now - no question.
I’d Cut Off A Pinky And Let You Wedgie Me To Coach Here (2):
Miami
Alabama
How these two limp into bottom of the Top 10 is a source of wonderment, and I feel strange writing them there, but remember my premise of where do you want to coach football TODAY? Alabama meddling alums are a pain in the ass and the average 18 year old kid could give two shits about Bear Bryant. Yeah, Alabama is a name brand. So was Braniff. Miami is still the U, but a bad hire, facility lag, and poor fan supports continues to erode their greatness. Let me coach there and my pack of thugs and molesters would light shit up again in short order. Until my serial killer fullback brings the whole mess down with a shoddy body disposal in the Everglades. You have to weigh down the torso, folks. Get out deep. Use airboats.
I Would Cut Off A Non-Weight Bearing Toe To Coach Here (8):
Tennessee
Auburn
Florida State
Notre Dame
Penn State
Nebraska
Oregon
Texas A&M
Tennesse is a just miss from the Top 10 - it’s certainly a very desirable job with great support and facilities. Their lack of in-state talent is a significant issue though. As for Auburn, despite their recent dominance over Alabama, the heart of the non-affiliated recruit within a half-day’s drive rests with the Tide. Auburn still has to rely on mercenaries. Florida St and Penn St are in similar straits with respect to sustainability - the primary difference is that Florida St sits in a recruiting Eden. Notre Dame is a paper tiger, but their recent easing of academic requirements is having a beneficial impact on that program. Whether their Fat Jersey Fuck of a coach can actually teach college players remains to be seen.
I Would Cut Off Your Finger To Coach Here:
(in no order) Arizona State, West Virginia, Virginia Tech, Oklahoma State, Arkansas, UCLA, Wisconsin, BYU, Georgia Tech, Clemson, Colorado, Cal, Washington, The Itasca Wampus Cats
Underachievers:
If you can rescue these programs, you will become a living God to their fan base and ESPN. Or, at the very least, set yourself up nicely for a failed NFL shot. Beware the inertia that has set these programs in flypaper.
1. Notre Dame. Do I even have to justify this?
2. UCLA. USC has a good chance of imploding, you have good tradition of athletes, intermittent gridiron success, a solid brand name, and a good recruiting environment easily overwhelms their faggy color schemes, but those advantages can’t compete with an administration that detests Saturdays. UCLA underperforms because it has made a conscious choice to do so.
3. Texas A&M. You’re the clear #2 university in a state that spits out blue chip athletes like Katy Morgan in a scene from Gridiron Gangbang, you have a determined fan base paired with strong administrative support, and a whole assortment of eligibility-affirming veal management programs for your inner-city Dallas recruits. Remind me again why it is that you’re kind of shitty?
4. Alabama. This program scraped into my Top 10 elite programs - how could I call them underachievers? Because, not so long ago, they would have been in the Top 5.
5. Carlisle Indian College. Oh, what. Jim Thorpe graduates and now you can’t compete?
Dissonance Jobs:
These are the jobs where the raging inferno of fan and administration expectation blazes hot and high, but no one outside these schools sees more than a flicker on the national landscape. Don’t tell them that though. Beware coaches: these folks are perpetually dissatisfied and imagine themselves to be a dozen slots above where they actually are. Rather than confront their delusion, these schools prefer to assign blame: to their head coach, to a hapless bespectacled school president, to ESPN, to the SLORC junta in Burma. Though seemingly good places to be (read $$$), many of these programs are an inviting beach behind a steel rake of hidden underwater coral. Guide thy career sloop wisely…
1. Arkansas. Forrest Gump said it best: Elite is as stupid believes.
2. Louisville. The ultimate urban commuter school gleefully accepts the guys that Miami deems too thuggish. To converse with one of their fans about their place in the college football landscape is to hear a bum with pissed pants ranting in full-on dementia.
3. Clemson. It’s amazing what a bullshit national championship will do to inflate expectations for decades thereafter. This isn’t a bad gig. You just need to understand that Clemp-suhn fans view their cute Jenna Fischer program like it was Carol Alt in her prime.
4. Ole Miss. In a place where 960 SATs meet 960K trust funds, the floppy-haired boys from Memphis are legitimately perplexed as to their current standing in the college football world. Some of it may be attributable to the fact that qualifying a Mississippi prep athlete is roughly comparable to getting an Al Queda lieutenant to read The Sisterhood Of The Traveling Pants aloud in mosque.
5. Alabama. Yeah, I said it. Classic dissonance here. I don’t hate Bama either. Right now this is the 4th best job in the SEC. Bama Fan believes it’s hands down the best in the nation. Is it possible that an obnoxious air of entitlement can actually physically weigh down a football program? I don’t quite understand the physics of it, but…yeah. It can. It adds .2 seconds to DJ Hall’s 40 time. That’s why Teh Major! left an Alabama gig as a Offensive Coordinator to collect kicking tees and wash jockstraps at Texas.
As always, I’m interested in your thoughts.
February 5, 2008 at 4:19 pm
I would cut off Henry James’ fingers (and toes) to coach at South Carolina.
February 5, 2008 at 6:44 pm
Can’t argue with alot of it. Maybe move ND a little higher. Huge
tradition plus the support of every mackerel snapper in the land
along with the NBC contract. Hard to put Georgia ahead of Bama,
just based on the last couple of years - too narrow of a window.
Bama will be back to try and add to a trophy case full of titles.
I would put USC and UT one and two respectively.
February 5, 2008 at 7:58 pm
Tennessee does have a lack of in-state talent. Geographical boundaries congregated the skill position guys in the western part of the state. But it shares a border with eight different states and has historically recruited them well.
February 5, 2008 at 8:02 pm
“Tennessee does have a lack of in-state talent”
Tell me about it. Burn.
February 5, 2008 at 9:22 pm
how the hell could you leave aggy off the dissonance jobs list?
February 5, 2008 at 9:31 pm
I think most of them have been beaten back into reality.
February 5, 2008 at 10:54 pm
I am not sure what I would cut off to coach Missouri – and perhaps Illinois as well - but I would at least volunteer a wide assortment of hair follicles and fingernails. Limited tradition and somewhat tepid fan bases to be sure, but each is the only competitive Division 1A school in a major state. Pluses: Solid momentum coming off last year, an inside track to recruiting Kansas City/St. Louis or Chicago, and favorable location for prime time coverage. In Missouri’s case, a resurgent KU helps shift that rivalry from the basketball court to the football field – the “rising wheat lifting all combines” kind of effect there.
Colorado also catches my attention for similar reasons. I’d welcome the chance to lure players to Boulder, and the Buffs’ history over the last 20 years is solid. Move all three of those schools up a bracket.
Oklahoma State doesn’t do a lot for me. They will always be a distant second in their second-rate state, and I would Petrino out of that coaching job fairly quickly. I would rather be at BC, Virginia, or maybe some other place not positioned as deeply in the penumbra of the college football spotlight. Perhaps familiarity breeding contempt there.
Despite the worst famine for the Irish since the eradication of the potato fungus, I would still place Notre Dame in the second highest category. TV, tradition, passion, TV, self-destiny, and TV.
Fair disclosure: I am the sole Longhorn fan who actually kind of likes Notre Dame. Of course, I also prefer to get my basketball analysis from a guy who learned the game playing with a ball made from old tamale husks in the barrios of El Paso. And I sometimes think Henry James should not be reviled – he is just misunderstood. No accounting for taste.
February 5, 2008 at 10:56 pm
“…qualifying a Mississippi prep athlete is roughly comparable to getting an Al Queda lieutenant to read The Sisterhood Of The Traveling Pants aloud in mosque.”
Genius.
USC is definitely not #1. As much as it pains me to say this, that’s Notre Dame. I wouldn’t even put USC in the top 3. The USC fans are “flavor of the week” types that would turn on USC after an 8-4 season.
Meanwhile, Notre Dame can generate any exorbitant amount of money for coaches or facilities, and they have their own TV contract and BCS loophole to go with their ridiculously large fanbase and recruiting range. I mean, holy tits in a toolbox, Notre Dame has a top 10 recruiting class after successfully choking away a 45 game winning streak against NAVY on their way to an atrocious season. Underachieving is dead on right.
February 6, 2008 at 6:07 am
Was it hard to pick the Itasca Wampus Cats over the Hutto Hippos?
OU is a funny case. The only reason they are a prime job is that they have successfully staked out North Texas as their recruiting territory. If they had followed up the Gibbs/Schnelly/Blake hires with a DiNardo, they might have fallen so much that they couldn’t get up. As it is, they hired Stoops, who will probably keep them in elite status for another 15 years.
February 6, 2008 at 7:03 am
How about UCF and USF? They have no expectations and no history, but reside in the mecca of great athletes. Plus they have virtually no academic requirements. With new and decent facilities and budgets that UH wishes for, they are going to put a hurt on the Louisville’s of the world. It also won’t be long before they are poaching non-academic qualifiers from up and down the East Coast. I guess their best bet is to aspire to the Texas Tech level on the long term.
February 6, 2008 at 7:18 am
Illinois needs to find a way to keep Notre Dame from taking all the good Chicago players.
February 6, 2008 at 8:27 am
“OU is a funny case. The only reason they are a prime job is that they have successfully staked out North Texas as their recruiting territory.”
Wow, you are a moron.
OU is a prime job because the university is founded on the principle of having a school that the football team can be proud of. Shameful? Oh, yeah. Effective? Believe it.
OU is a prime job because their fans are like drug addicts about winning: once they get a taste, there’s no price they won’t pay to keep getting their fix. See: Switzer, Barry. See: Bob Stoops’ contract and annual salary.
Of OU’s national titles, every single one was claimed when the roster and starting lineup was predominantly filled with Oklahomans. The majority of the All Americans are Oklahomans, and 3 of the 4 Heisman winners are Oklahomans.
OU staked out north Texas as their recruiting territory after they became an elite job, not before.
February 6, 2008 at 9:00 am
Oh yeah?
February 6, 2008 at 9:33 am
I’m a moron? Could be. You, however, are deluding yourself. Check out the OU athletics website. They brag about their AAs from Texas. They do that because recruiting Texas is a key part of their strategy.
Don’t believe me. Listen to Switzer. In his book, he said recruiting Texas was a key part of his strategy.
Wilkinson built the program with Okies, winning through superior organization. That lasted until Royal took his methods to Texas, beating OU 9 times out of 10. Then OU realized they needed superior talent to dominate.
Read Scipio’s original post. The best jobs are at schools that are in region’s awash with D-1A talent. The state of Oklahoma produces about 45 D-1A athletes per year. That has to feed three D-1A programs. If Oklahoma is limited to Okies, they are not an elite program.
February 6, 2008 at 9:38 am
They also don’t have enough black guys.
February 6, 2008 at 11:07 am
They make up for it with inbreds
February 7, 2008 at 11:25 pm
retrobater:
Notre Dame is a tough place to assess because there’s such a gap between what they should be and what they have been for the last 15 years.
You may be right.
I’ll disagree on Bama/Georgia. I’ll take the UGA gig over Bama. Better recruiting base. Better facilities. Alums are 14% less likely to put you on probation.
Other thoughts:
UCF/South Florida will be very interesting, Bragg. Good call. Louisville and W. Virginia used to really go after the 2nd and 3rd tier Florida guys. UCF and USF effectively keeps those guys closer to home and doesn’t hassle them with academics or cold weather.
As for USC, I’ll disagree. They have their bandwagon fans, but that’s to be expected. They’re the only team in the state of California that truly deeply gives a shit about football. Every one of Cali’s best athletes is within a day’s drive of them. They also have very solid tradition and fairly malleable morals about getting it done.
That’s a hell of a job for a football coach.
Dr. J:
Okie State intrigues me as an experiment, an object lesson. Can a shitload of money pumped into facilities buy you a football team? We know when it’s directed into player’s pockets it can. I’m curious if T Boone can jump them up a level.
February 8, 2008 at 8:54 am
I concur with the Missouri bit above…I’m not delusional, it isn’t in the top 20 or even 30, but being the only DI program in a moderately sized state is a large benefit. And the facilities are now top 20, maybe top 10. Combined with the building success of Pinkel, there is at least a chance of building a tradition there.
My other quibble is with Scipio’s opening assumptions. “Access to fertile recruiting grounds” is clearly hyper-important, but one unstated way to access those recruiting grounds is to have some sort of geographical advantage. While the U may have issues, being located in Miami gives it a huge recruiting advantage. Same with SoCal teams like UCLA and USC, and, potentially, USF. Texas has a different geographical advantage in being the flagship university of the most fertile prep football state in the union. ND has a metaphysical advantage in being the flagship university of the cat-o-lics.
I think of it as you either have to have a tradition advantage or a geographical advantage, and those programs that can combine both are the meccas of coaching.
February 8, 2008 at 12:25 pm
wn8bs:
Re your quibble, I don’t think we have a disagreement. I think the key word there is “access” - however it is achieved, whether by virtue of national presence or geographical proximity. ND was a great example. For most, it’s physical proximity though.
February 8, 2008 at 12:37 pm
NateHeupel - I just read somewhere that between OU and OSU, only five Okie kids were taken this year. How many were OU?
February 8, 2008 at 2:27 pm
You know how some folks call OU “The University of Texas - Norman Campus”? Stoops took that shit to heart.
Three Oklahoma kids, and one of them is a friggin’ kicker. He should count as half.
February 8, 2008 at 3:08 pm
I think you owe TaylorT an apology. If nothing else, Barking Carnival stands for civility.
February 8, 2008 at 3:39 pm
11 of OU’s 21 recruits are from Texas.
Including all three of their 5 stars.
February 8, 2008 at 3:59 pm
“I’m a moron? Could be. You, however, are deluding yourself. Check out the OU athletics website. They brag about their AAs from Texas. They do that because recruiting Texas is a key part of their strategy.”
I was born and raised in Oklahoma. Self-delusion is CRITICAL to survival in that post-apocalyptic wasteland.
I think what we disagree on is terms. Texas recruiting didn’t make OU an elite job. It’s not “the only reason” OU is an elite job, nor is it the primary reason. The primary reasons are tradition and commitment (aka selling souls). OU can drop as much money, time, and effort into the football program as anyone out there. It’s the only thing Oklahoma has going for it.
Would OU be a 2nd tier team if they didn’t have the incredible Texas talent they get? You’d have to be an idiot to think so. As another post here points out, OU’s 2000 MNC team was the only recent MNC team that wasn’t just insanely loaded with NFL talent. They were all good coaching, team-first attitudes, and sheer will.
HOWEVER, would OU be in the preseason top 10 year in and year out without the Texas kids? Probably not. Would they be in the postseason top 10 as often as not? Probably.
And one last thing you probably saw coming:
Darrell K Royal
Born: Hollis, Oklahoma
College: University of Oklahoma
I-35 runs two directions, sir. UT is an “elite program” because an Okie made it so. Don’t fool yourself into thinking otherwise.
February 8, 2008 at 4:02 pm
Yes, he does deserve an apology. My initial reaction was a bit out of line.
As for the three 5*, I can live with that if you can live with borrowing Darrell Royal from Oklahoma.
February 8, 2008 at 4:11 pm
I can live with it. It’s not like he’s Switzer.
February 8, 2008 at 4:20 pm
ahh … the annual rite of UT fans pissing and moaning that Mack can’t lock down his own state.
well, at least the recruits UT did get have a nice vacation in sunny San Diego awaiting them, which is nice.
February 8, 2008 at 7:13 pm
Nobody can “lock down” Texas, you imbecile.
February 9, 2008 at 8:57 am
“I can live with it. It’s not like he’s Switzer.”
Touche.
February 11, 2008 at 8:43 pm
Pretty sure it’s “Katie” Morgan, not “Katy”.
February 12, 2008 at 11:34 am
“Would OU be a 2nd tier team if they didn’t have the incredible Texas talent they get? You’d have to be an idiot to think so. ”
what